Nightly Visits
by mackenzie925
Summary: For Clark and Chloe, this night is no different.


**TITLE:** **Nightly Visits**  
Rating: PG  
Pairing: Chloe/Clark  
Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville  
Author's Note: This is a one-shot. Enjoy. :-)

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Clark opened his eyes to darkness. Before him, the room seemed still, silent, as the deep night began to turn into the wee hours of morning. Outside, the moon slid slowly behind grey clouds, hiding it's light from the earth. Snow drifted through the cold air, like confetti on New Year's Eve, and he could hear the small flakes glistening against the window a few feet beside him. Because he was on his side, he could not see her next to him. But Clark already knew she would not be there. Just as every night, she would be up to see, to make sure, to gaze, despite how many times he insisted she needed a good night's sleep for a change.

If he was not there to pull her back into bed every night, Clark was sure Chloe would never go back to sleep.

Tonight, he knew, would be no different.

Clark sat up and rubbed a hand over his dreary eyes. He refocused his momentarily foggy vision on the dresser that sat just under the now snow covered window pane. By habit only, he looked to the digital alarm clock that sat on the night stand next to his bed, the large, green numbers reading a few minutes past two in the morning. After a few seconds to regain his otherwise sleepy consciousness, he stood and moved to the rocking chair in the corner of the dark room. The jeans he wore the night before were still strewn across the armrest, and he grabbed them, slipping them on over his blue boxer shorts. He decided against putting a T-shirt on, figuring he would only have to undress again in a few minutes away.

Assuming, of course, that he could get her to come with him this time.

A few nights prior, they fell asleep in the living room, their conversation having led them to sit on the couch in front of the fireplace. Clark warmed milk for her over the stove that night, knowing the home remedy helped him plenty when he was a child. Surprisingly, she took the drink without question, drank it, let it soothe her weary heart - and within the hour they were stretched out on the couch. Once she fell asleep on his chest, Clark reached for the red, fleece blanket folded across the back of the couch cushions, and covered them both under its warmth.

It was that memory that settled in Clark's mind as he opened the door to their bedroom. He looked out into the dark hallway, trying to sense where she might be in the house tonight. Rarely did she leave the house completely, but Clark always dressed each night as if she might have ventured further than usual. When he finally stepped out of the bedroom, the stairs to the first floor appeared immediately to his left just a few feet away. For a split second, Clark decided she might have gone downstairs again, perhaps for a drink of water for her dry throat, or maybe to sit in front of the fireplace to warm up. Yet as he hesitated at the top and scanned the first floor with his X-ray vision, nothing appeared.

However, when he concentrated on listening in the silence, soft crying reached his ears. And it was coming from a room just ahead of him.

Though she always ended her nightly venture someplace different, her path always reached this room above the rest, the very reason why she ventured at all. Why she needed to look, to gaze, to see. It made sense, of course. Actually, Clark would be lying if he did not admit his own tendency to stare inside whenever he passed it in his travels. It was to be expected.

With a soft sigh, Clark passed the first room on his left to reach the second. Though Chloe's crying was quite soft, it seemed to drown out everything else around him - the tick tock of the clock downstairs above the fireplace, the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen, and the strengthening wind outside. And he wondered if maybe, possibly, it might be best to leave her there tonight for a change. Maybe what she needed all along was time alone, and for the past few weeks Clark has taken that away from her by insisting she come back to bed and sleep. With their work at The Daily Planet, the phone calls, not to mention the frequent visits from his mother and her father for support, time alone was rare.

But he could not imagine letting her deal with this alone.

Clark tried to remain strong for her, despite his own weakness. He needed her comfort just as much as she needed his. And, in a way, by comforting her, he felt her comfort him in return. Maybe she didn't realize what she was really doing, but spending as much time with her as possible seemed to help Clark forget their true, mutual despair. When he finally pushed the door open, though only a crack, he could see Chloe's dark, shaded sillhouette painted on the opposite wall before his eyes. He saw only the slightest movement in the shadow, but knew by experience alone that she was still crying. Actually, during the past few weeks, Clark began to learn how she grieved, how she cried. And from what he saw at the moment, he knew her cries were more of a silent weep. The same kind she buried in his chest, in his love.

Finally he slipped in quietly, trying to keep his movement soft as he walked across the room. At first, he could tell Chloe did not sense his presence. If she had, she would do one of two things; tell him to leave and insist she was fine, or pull him into her embrace and cry in his arms. For both of them right now, with his own emotion building inside him at the sight of his weary lover standing so very still, in the exact same spot she always stood when in this room, Clark hoped for the latter. Hoped they could be there for each other again, and again, and again. Hoped they would never stop fighting the pain. Hoped they would never stop loving one another, knowing that love alone was the reason both kept going, kept living.

Once Clark was only a few inches behind her, he placed a warm hand on her bare shoulder just underneath her golden hair. Sometimes Chloe wore a robe over her white, sleeveless nightgown when she walked around the house at night. Tonight, however, she must have decided against it, depite how cold it must have been in the house - something he sensed only because he saw the goosebumps blossom on her beautiful, white skin. His heart ached when he stepped up closer to her, seeing one hand over her mouth while the other held onto the edge of the wooden crib so tightly as to cause her knuckles to whiten.

The wooden crib they both now stood over and looked down into ...

The wooden crib Chloe visited night after night, searching, hoping ... praying ...

The wooden crib that was empty.

Clark tightened his grip on her shoulder and pressed his chest up against her back, lacing his right arm around her waist protectively. Gratefully, she leaned back into him, removed the hand on her mouth to settle it on the arm across her waist, so naturally as if she knew he was there along, not a bit surprised by him or what he offered her. Chloe felt him bury his face in her neck, then kiss it, keeping her close to him. Muffled, against her skin, in a whisper, he asked, "You okay?"

Chloe closed her eyes, her silence a quiet reminder to Clark. No matter how hard he tried to help her, to help both of them, their love never seemed to be strong enough to take the pain away completely, at least not yet. And, truthfully, maybe nothing could. But, every now and then, when they least expected it, they were given that wonderful second, that brief moment of relief. It was something to strive for, something positive to illuminate their way through their dark sadness. Relief that could only be bought with their deep, passionate love.

Right now, holding Chloe so tightly against him, Clark hoped it would come soon.

Finally, the silence broken by her sniffles, her tears, Chloe said, "I'm so sorry."

"Sorry?" he asked with genuine disbelief. "Sorry for what?"

Chloe started to cry more, the tears streaming down her crimson cheeks. In response, she felt Clark remove his hand from her shoulder to encircle her completely in his arms, in his loving embrace. The one and only place that felt like home anymore. The one and only place she could feel safe. Feeling his warm breath against the skin on her neck, Chloe let her tears fall freely, knowing she could be vulnerable. Knowing he would pick her up, wipe away her sadness, give her strength once more. The only person that could breathe life into her lungs, into her soul.

Quietly, she answered him, her voice barely audible above the silence. "For losing our baby."

Clark shook his head. "You didn't lose our baby, Chloe."

It was the same song, the same plea. The same guilt. Clark knew she felt it. The wretched feelings, coupled with the crippling sadness at her core, kept her awake night after night. Though he ressurred her each and every time, his words rarely helped. Because really, words were not the answer. Words would not drive back her despair, nor his own.

Cliche aside, only love could do that.

So with renewed confidence, he turned her in his arms, and looked deeply into her eyes. With a hand to her face, cupping her cheek with sweet affection, Clark whispered, "Don't you ever think that. None of this was your fault. None of it."

Chloe looked away from him, to the floor. "But it was my body. My responsbility. I should have protected ... I should of ... I ...". But she trailed off, her cries, her tears taking over completely now.

"There was nothing you could have done. You did everything you were supposed to do," Clark reiterated again. When she didn't look at him, he lifted her face to his, forcing her to see the honesty in his features. Forcing her to see the truth written in the deepest center of his eyes, where his soul resided. "Chloe, you did everything right. Everything the doctor wanted you to do during your pregnancy. Please, don't blame yourself ... please ...".

Chloe's features then turned from guilt to something much deeper, to a place she tried so hard to run from. The reality she refused to accept, yet could not forget. And everytime she stepped into this room, into the very nursery she and Clark built for their first, newborn child, she is reminded of that day. The day she gave birth to a baby that didn't cry, that didn't move, that died before she took her first breath. Over the course of the last few weeks, all Chloe could do was cry. It was all she had left. Through it all, fighting his own deep sadness, Clark cradled her, hugged her, kissed her, ensured her that daylight would come again.

In the end, all they could do was hold each other. And pray something would help them through.

Pray their love was enough ... because it had to be ...

Chloe felt the cries rise up her throat again, and clasping the hand on her cheek with her own, she cried deeply, her voice cracking, "Clark ... " tears streaming down her face again, her cries only strengthening when she noticed the soft glisten of tears on her lover's face, " ... our baby girl ...".

Clark could not fight his tears any longer. His emotion was too strong, the urge to release them too powerful. And, above all, they needed this. They needed to grief for the loss of their child. They needed to remember everything that was supposed to be - the future they envisioned for nine months.

And when he pulled her lovingly into his embrace again, her face against his chest, her cries, her tears dampening his skin, he could only whisper his words against his choking cry.

"I know." Pause. Feeling her tremble against him, her hand on his stomach, her cheek against his heart, he buried his face in her hair, in her neck. "I know."

When the hour finally passed, so did their despair. If only for a moment. If only because of the heat in their love. It didn't take long for Clark to convince her to follow him back to bed. To the place where they can hold each other all night. Protect each other from the outside world. In minutes, she fell asleep in his arms, her head on his chest, her arms wrapped around him, holding him tightly. In seconds, the room blurred as Clark drifted back into his dreams. Into his nightmares. And faintly, he heard it. He heard it every night, every time he brought Chloe back to him.

The cry of a baby ... a wish from his heart ...

Another nightly visit ... come and gone.

_**fin.**_


End file.
